As you may (or may not) have noticed, my website has seen a bit of an update. The entire layout is much wider, 980px wide to be exact, and there's a lot of the negative place in the content region (more on that later).
I had two goals I wanted to achieve with this revision;
- Build an absolute focus on content
- Personalize each of my entries with unique styles (like a magazine spread).
I'm pushing myself to write often, and write a lot. Amongst the many benefits of writing regularly, the most attractive is gaining clarity of thought. With that in mind, I've tried to re-arrange the layout of my site around it's content. You'll notice that visiting my homepage, right away you can begin reading my latest entry. This is pivotal on two fronts. First, the prominence of the entry means I will be more conscious about what I write. This means I will be marinating ideas in my head for a little longer before putting them into words, and hopefully push out quality entries. Secondly, the vast content space below the header and above the footer means I have a lot of room to play with, literally.
What you don't see is a lot of CSS lines holding everything in place and acting as scaffolding for my future posts. This excites me! I have always been a visual perfectionist, and while it has many drawbacks, one of good things about being a perfectionist is the level of excitement that can be generated from achieving the desired result. The way this website operates, looks and feels is exactly as I have desired. It makes me happy, and a happy designer, as a result, can move along the to-do queue and get more things done.
Speaking of getting things done, I want to tell you what I've been up to.
In no particular order;
- I'm working closely with a friend to Design and Develop a Travel themed iPhone/iPad application.
This is my first joint venture in the iPhone land. - I'm also creating an online/offline HTML5 powered text-editor that will make writing more enjoyable, and thus, more addictive.
I'm scratching a personal itch here, but some people may also find it helpful. - I have been regularly reading and studying the philosophies of the lean-startup and everything to do with the startup ecosystems. People like Paul Graham, Steve Blank, Eric Ries, Fred Wilson, Babak Nivi, Naval Ravikant, Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz all have influenced my thoughts and actions tremendously these past few months.
I'm cooking up an umbrella company that will realize a lot of those teachings. - Last, but not least, I have drafted a dozen of blog articles that need to be polished and posted. Everything from interface design principles that I put in practice everyday to the lessons learned along the way.
I'm really pushing myself to get into the habit of writing frequently.
We're wrapping up the decade soon and I'm furiously trying to put things in order and welcome the New year (and a new decade) with the kind of momentum and ambition that yields results. 2011 is the year I turn 26, and it's the year I will be delivering results.
That's all for now. I will leave you with this appropriate wisdom of Mark Twain.
"The secret of getting ahead is getting started. The secret of getting started is breaking your complex overwhelming tasks into small manageable tasks, and then starting on the first one." ~Mark Twain
Fin